l-in-chief over the military forces of the republic.

In the early periods of the Roman history, every possible precaution
was taken to keep the military power in a condition of very strict
subordination to the authority of the civil magistrate and of law.
Very stringent regulations were adopted to secure this end. No
portion of the army, except such small detachments as were required
for preserving order within the walls, was allowed to approach the
city. Great commanders, in returning from their victorious
campaigns, were obliged to halt and encamp at some distance from the
gates, and there await the orders of the Roman Senate. The _Senate_
was, in theory, the great repository of political power. This Senate
was not, however, as the word might seem in modern times to denote,
a well-defined and compact body of legislators, designated
individually to the office, but rather a class of hereditary nobles,
very numerous, and deriving their power from immemorial usage, and
from that strange and unaccountable feeling of deference and awe
with which the mass of mankind always look up to an established, and
especially an ancient, aristocracy. The Senate were accustomed to
convene at stated times, in assemblages which were, sometimes,
conducted with a proper degree of formality and order, and sometimes
on the other hand, exhibited scenes of great tumult and confusion.
Their power, however, whether regularly or irregularly exercised,
was supreme. They issued edicts, they enacted laws, they allotted
provinces, they made peace, and they declared war. The armies, and
the generals who commanded them, were the _agents_ employed to do
their bidding.

The Roman armies consisted of vast bodies of men which, when not in
actual service, were established in permanent encampments in various
parts of the empire, wherever it was deemed necessary that troops
should be stationed. These great bodies of troops were the
celebrated Roman legions, and they were renowned throughout the
world for their discipline, their admirable organization, the
celerity of their movements, and for the indomitable courage and
energy of the men. Each legion constituted, in fact, a separate and
independent community. Its camp was its city. Its general was its
king. In time of war it moved, of course, from place to place, as
the exigencies of the service required; but in time of peace it
established itself with great formality in a spacious and permanent
encampment,